


Falling and Ascending

by lordnelson100



Category: TOLKIEN J. R. R. - Works & Related Fandoms, The Lord of the Rings - All Media Types, The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Action/Adventure, BAMF Gimli, BAMF Legolas Greenleaf, Banter, Competence Kink, Eventual Romance, Horror, Love, M/M, Mirkwood, Monsters, Post-Lord of the Rings, Various Elves - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-20
Updated: 2017-04-20
Packaged: 2018-10-21 09:54:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,296
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10682898
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lordnelson100/pseuds/lordnelson100
Summary: Adventure, horror, and love. After the War, Gimli and Legolas join a scouting patrol in the forest long known as Mirkwood. Is it safe yet? No.





	Falling and Ascending

### Chapter I: Falling

A long fall, a hard landing, then deep darkness.

Now, let it be said that such an experience is far less disastrous for a dwarf than it would be for you or I. A mining people, gifted with stubbornness and ambition by their Maker,  _will t_ ake their fair share of hard tumbles. Which is not to say it was pleasant.

By a combination of luck, practice, and hereditary talent, Gimli landed belly down, hands to either side and level with his face. So he broke neither wrist nor back, nor landed on the heavy axe strapped across his shoulders. A hard head packed in a good helm meant his wits weren’t addled either, though he’d taken a sharp knock on the way down that left a lingering ache.

Silently, he moved through a list of well-practiced checks. Roll the neck; breathe in and out and feel the ribs; test out the ground with his fingers to make sure he was lying on solid earth before he shifted his weight.

Left leg, though. He was pretty sure that was buggered. A warm, wet flow inside his boot and a stabbing hurt just under the knee. Landed on something sharp, he’d bet. All in all, not the worst inventory.

There swam up in front of him quite suddenly an image of Legolas: that look he’d get on his fair face when fate rolled its dice and threw against them; a set of the jaw, stoic yet pained. The elf would be in quite a taking just now. More reason to get a move on and figure out just how he was getting himself back upstairs.

He’d need a light. Like any dwarf alive he had flint and steel handy about him, but there were quite a few reasons not to strike up flame before getting one’s bearings. First things first.

He sat up. Darkness flowed around him: old close air tinged with rottenness. Something very faint, half a feel of the air, half instinct, told him the space around him was neither very large nor fully enclosed. There was a stirring as of open passages, leading further into the underground night. His eyes began to adjust.

He could begin to make out the square shaft above him through which he had tumbled. The downward plunge had been very deep indeed. They’d been indoors, the sky covered, when he and the Wood Elves’ scouting party had met with unexpected danger. Looking upward, he thought he could detect far overhead a faint glow that might have been torchlight reflected on dark wood. But it did little or nothing to dispel the shadows down where he’d landed.

He tried to recall the way of it. Falling -- he’d take an oath this shaft was no natural fissure or hidden crevasse, nor practical working mineshaft crafted by man or dwarf. From what he glimpsed rushing past, it plunged straight down, four sides of sheer stone smooth as if it had been measured and ruled. Which meant . . . he put that line of thought aside. _Need more facts. Time to stop gathering coal and begin doing. Get your feet under you, my lad. Or foot._

Putting his hand out to meet the wall he could faintly make out to one side, he shifted to his undamaged leg and got up. A curse rose to his lips as all his bruises joined his injured leg in protest. The words died in his throat as there came to his ear a new sound, faint as ever whispered, but _there_.

It was . . . yes . . . again. _Breathing_. Someone was down here in the dark with him.

He was no green young traveller, nor a fool in a grandmother’s fireside tale; therefore he was not even slightly tempted to call out ,“Who’s there?” Instead he listened. For many long minutes, he kept as like a still stone as he was able. Which was silent indeed. But no other sound came, no stir of limb or shift of earth.

Meantime he stared as hard as he could through the shadows in the direction of that barely audible hint of life. He convinced himself that against a far wall he could just make out a huddled form: the body of some person, though of what make he could not be certain.

For a moment a cold fear clutched in his chest. One of his companions? But no. It could be none of the ranging party of Thranduil’s Elves he’d been with above. In the frantic rush of events, when the seemingly solid floor gave way beneath their feet, it seemed to him that all the Elves had leapt clear. Only he, a hand's breath slower and a great deal briefer of limb, had fallen short of solid ground and safety. If any had joined in the same fall, they’d have surely tumbled together; he’d have been ware of them even as he fell himself.

He thought for a minute. _This stranger in the dark, now. If I can hear them, they can hear me or would do, if they were conscious. But if this body is lying there still as a lump, unable even to cry out for help, it may be some earlier victim of this same foul snare, left broken in the dark._ At that thought he made a choice.

Getting down on his knees and thinking  _may I live to be called a fool for this_ , he crawled forward an inch at a time. When he got close enough he reached out gently, finding with his fingers what seemed to him to be the other body’s leg. Warm, though not very. Neither fur nor scales nor otherwise than flesh and cloth, he’d hazard. But unmoving, unresponsive to his touch.

Right. Time to risk a bit of light. He sorted the stuff from his belt pouch: the flint and steel, a bit of matchstick tinder. Then he struck. With the light the space around him uncovered itself and revealed the body stretched on the stony floor. He could not help the sound he made then; but there was no one to hear it.

### Chapter 2: Upwards

Up. Up. Hold with one hand, brace with his working leg, strike with the handpick. A bit of the wall came away; another handhold carved out from the unyielding shaft. Gimli labored another foot upward. The light in the shaft slowly increased, though of what hour it might be, he’d lost all track; he’d climbed up maybe half as high as he’d fallen, by his guess.

He felt the weariness in his own shoulders, the drowsiness and chill that follow untended hurt and a long lonely labor. Patient as a good smith at the forge, he needed to be, unwilling to waste fine work by a hasty hand. He didn't like his chances if he were to fall backwards now.

He had no way of knowing what had become of his friends above, whether they were beset themselves and as much in need of help as he.

Suddenly, as if thought called forth the very object of his doubt, lantern light shone out, maybe twenty feet or so above him. He heard his name shouted, echoing off the wet stone. The sudden change was all at once so bright, so loud, that his handhold almost slipped. He gulped with relief and bellowed back. “Oyta! Oyta!”*

“Gimli, you’re with us? Hold fast!”

It was Legolas’ voice. Relief flooded through him so intense he could have wept. He heard his friend call to those above him and in a moment the elf was there beside Gimli, bracing himself with his feet against the slimy stone wall, paying out rope with one hand and with the other, lifting a lamp to search his face.

For a long moment they gazed at each other, both struck dumb, till Legolas bent his neck and brought his forehead to Gimli’s. 

“I’m in one piece!” The dwarf found his own voice shaky, to his chagrin. "We’ll talk above."

His friend nodded. “Wait here. Don’t move. I’ll be no more than one minute.”

He swiftly hooked the lantern onto Gimli’s belt and gave a tug on the rope. Quickly the people above drew him up.

Alone again, clinging to the chilly stone: one of the longest minutes he could ever remember. Much as he would have liked to throw his arms around Legolas and be rescued from this dizzy perch this very moment, he was too heavy to be lifted one-handed like a strayed lamb from a well. _It’s fine_ , he told himself, _it’s fine. Almost there._

In short order, his comrade was back with Oroben, the patrol leader. Together the two of them deftly passed ropes around the dwarf’s torso and hauled him and themselves to the top. It was a sign of how beaten he was that he couldn't find breath for even a token protest at being roped up like awkward baggage, and a sign of how worried the elves were that they maintained a tight-lipped silence all the way.

After they released him gently to the ground, a safe distance from the lip of the void, he lay for a long minute gasping on the good solid earth, unable even to speak. Someone slid a water-skin into his hand and he gratefully drank, then laid his head down for one more moment. There was a warm hand on the back of his neck, and he would very much have liked to stay just as he was.

But he couldn't. He turned over and opened one eye. Legolas was bent over Gimli’s blood-soaked leg, quickly and gently assessing the hurt. The six of Thranduil’s people whose patrol they were sharing stood surrounding him, looking downward, whispering in their Silvan language. Mayhap the thunderous look on Legolas’ face was holding back their tide of questions.

“I’m alright,” he said at last.”The leg’s the worst of it.”

The dam burst. “But how? Are your bones made of granite indeed?” Another of the patrol broke in, “The sides are utterly sheer! We could find neither handhold nor ledge to climb down. How did you climb back up?”

A short while ago Gimli couldn’t wait to get back to their company. Now the flow of elven voices was near to overwhelming his aching head. He growled, “How did I climb up? We dwarves eat stone and shit it back out again, haven’t you heard?”

At that Legolas half smiled, but the other elves only look bewildered, so he held up his small sharp handpick. “Try keeping useful tools in your pocket instead of leaves and berries, and you might survive more ills than falling out of a tree.”

That drew a laugh at least, and one said, “Yet, Master Dwarf, methinks you’d be clinging there yet without our help, and climbing still when the sun next rises, unless you wove your beard into a rope and hauled yourself out!”

 _That’s more like it_ , Gimli thought, his heart lightening. He allowed himself a moment to look about him. Outside twilight had fallen, but birds were still singing in the pines. He was not a complicated dwarf, he liked to believe. These were his friend’s people and he liked their company and they were relieved he hadn't died this day. He wished he didn't have bad news to tell; that he hadn't to stain their joy and burden their hearts. He would as lief put off from moment to moment the telling. It was meant to be an age of peace and prospering that they were living in now: the age of the King. But Middle Earth had not shed of all its sorrows. He could wait no longer to deal with the freshest of these.

“But the fall itself! We lowered a full length of rope without seeing sign of you or the bottom,” Oroben’s voice contained a mix of curiosity, relief, and wariness. “We had to send a runner for more rope. Surely even the sturdiness of dwarves is not proof against such a height.” He was a grave dark-haired elf, with a slow serious manner of talking, the captain of this small company that scouted the forest edge. That this accident happened under his watch clearly disturbed him. 

“Aye. It’s a good sixty feet to the bottom, I’ll wager. On the way down, my fall was broken halfway down by a layer of something: like a nest of reeds and sticks it seemed. But when I tried to get a footing, I broke though and fell the rest of the way. I’d have likely been a dead dwarf otherwise, hard bones or no.”

“That cannot be mere fortune,” says Legolas, his face darkening. “There is some fell purpose in this, it seems to me.”

“And likewise to me.  _Tada gulud_. This thing is a trap, by my guess. Whatever made it, wants what it catches to reach the bottom damaged, not dead.” *

The patrol looked at one another; they had all lived through long years when darkness and danger shadowed Mirkwood, and he could see them turning the signs over in their minds, the puzzle pieces snapping into place.

Oroben said slowly. “A trap?  That would explain somewhat of this strange place. And yet we find still no sign of a hunter in search of prey. No trace of orc or man or other known foe. Can we be sure indeed that this peril is no accidental ruin, that it has indeed been set as an intended snare for our feet?”

“Yes.” Gimli answered, and his tongue felt heavy. “Because there’s someone else down there.”

The elves murmured in surprise and dismay. Something unusual must have shown on his own face, because Legolas took his hand in silence, a rare thing before other people. Without that strong grip, he felt as if he might never have been able to speak what was needed.

“There’s one of your kind down there. He’s alive, though only just, I think. And he’s very . . . very badly off. Something’s been at him. Something that--“

The horror of the scene in the pit’s heart suddenly rose up in his gorge. He, Gimli, dwarf of many journeys, who had faced many strange perils, even to the Paths of the Dead and the Gate of Mordor, could suddenly find no words. He turned to look in the dark eyes of Legolas and found his own grief and pain and pity reflected back to him.

Struggling, he said in his own tongue, “ _Legolas, ekun derazi._ ” Legolas tried to find the Sindar word for their listeners. “ _Mata_. Devoured.”

“But . . . you said that he _lives_.”

He could only nod.

 

### Chapter 3: A Decision

The red twilight had faded into night. Beside them the dark pit yawned.

It was Legolas who spoke to the company, standing with folded arms, the great bow of Lorien at his back and his shining hair hanging over his shoulder.

“This, then, is our choice. We know only what we do not know. Whatever foe built this snare is unknown to any here. We have little idea if it hides beneath us in this pit or has for some reason unknown strayed far from this place.”

Lamben, the gentlest of the woodland rangers, lay on his stomach and seemed to stare down into the pit, yet Gimli saw that his eyes were closed. Whether he listened for some voice or only struggled in imagination with the nightmare below them, he could not tell.

“We know not the name of this stranger whose tormented body lies below. Nor how long he has lain there, or if even he still breathes and suffers as he did a few hours past. We have among us only you six, and the arms of Gimli and I, and my friend is wounded. The path below is strange to us and dark. Yet it seems to me that time is urgent upon us.”

While he and Legolas and the Fellowship followed the Quest, these Silvan Elves of Thranduil had fought their own war against the forces of darkness. But they’d waged it under trees that they knew, against familiar enemies. Spiders and trolls, orcs and wolves: against these an elf could spend his arrows and maybe lose his long life.  Not for them the Ring-wraiths and horrors out of the Dark Days, the profound mysteries and terrible choices that he and those he loved had faced in the War of the Ring. They were maybe innocent, a little, in some ways Gimli no longer was, though they were centuries older than he himself.

Still, it occurred to him that in the long, long years of Mirkwood’s darkness and the Great War, many of the Woodland Realm’s people must have gone astray in the forest and never been accounted for. Some to the horrors of Dol Guldur, others to the dens of the orc, still others to fates unknown. How many families had some brother or sister whose name was still dear, but whose body was lost beyond finding? With pain he thought of the dishonored bones of own his kin in Moria, forever lost in those darkened halls.

Oroben’s brow remained clouded. “If we had found this monster’s lair, and knew not of the prisoner within it, the path of wisdom would be clear. To send back to the halls of your father the King for aid. As it stands, we risk losing all our lives, going into this perilous lair lightly armed and all unknowing of our enemy.”

 _And yet,_ Gimli thought, _we_ do _know about the poor lost traveler. Surely that makes all the difference_. But he kept his tongue still. He thought he read the same thought on the face of Legolas, but the Prince said simply to his cousins, “You say true.”

Their leader seemed to struggle within himself: “Son of Thranduil, you and Gimli have wandered through great dangers that will be passed down in song. What is your counsel?”

“That you are the captain of this company, however small it is, and I must not speak for you, for your lives are your own. For Gimli and I, our road lies together.”

 _Legolas does not say it, but he doesn't need to_ , Gimli thought to himself. _He and I are going back down, whether or no._

“Then hear my decision,” said Oroben. “I will not leave this poor sufferer below, alone, even for a single night more, not even to seek further aid. Not while we have hope that we can free him and raise our hands to his defense at need. We will go below.”

It seemed as if the whole company let out their breath together.

Somewhile later, Gimli sat on the floor, resting his leg, watching Legolas draw a plan on the floor while Oroben intently looked on. His friend’s fair face seemed to him watchful yet peaceful, wise and young and old, all at the same time. _What a gift he has for lighting up a warmth of spirit in other hearts, when terrible and foul things surround us._  Even these other elves were taking heart from his valiance.

The dwarf leaned back against a wall. _Listen to yourself. Oh by my beard, this is a stupid pain I’m nursing._ He didn’t mean his battered leg. In his mind’s eye, he saw Legolas running on before him at dawn over an endless plain; standing with the rain in his hair on a dark night on top a battlement, with all the armies of night arrayed below. Was that nostalgia he felt? To miss the days of a hopeless and exhausting battle which they scarcely dared hope to survive? _I could be home in a warm hall under the Mountain, boasting over an ale, instead of nursing my bruises to face another monster in lands that aren’t even my own. And yet I would choose to be no where else._

What strange tricks the heart played; he laughed. When he opened his eyes, he realized that Legolas was looking at him with concern. And had just called his name once or twice. “Still here,” he said sheepishly. Legolas simply said, “Good.”

Oroben put his caution to good use. They did not go charging rashly back down. He made Gimli describe everything he saw and remembered, slowly and clearly. How many passages opened from the main chamber (four, one for each point of the compass). Where did the stranger’s body lie (on the west side, with his head to the wall). Had he spoken any word, or given any sign to Gimli (alas, no). Was there aught in his clothes or gear to give a sign who he was (Gimli had a rough impression that he was dressed as an elf of the woods, yet somewhat differently from the Esgalen people, as if from afar).

The captain made every member of the tiny band check each weapon in their arms and speak back their part. The sun was long set and the night advancing as they prepared to descend.

### Chapter 4: Another Descent

They roped down into the pit. By agreement, four archers immediately covered each of the dark passages leading out of the main chamber, while another soldier set lanterns and torches.

Gimli, Legolas, and the dark-haired captain knelt together by the still body on the floor. It still breathed. Gently they lifted their lights to examine it. For Gimli, this was his second look. Still he felt nausea afresh. The others had his words to warn them, but they could not hold back a cry of pity that echoed along the walls. The sleeper did not stir.

It was a heartbreak of this living world that they could allow themselves only a moment even for this grief. They covered the unconscious figure with a cloak and stood to arms.

By the light of their lanterns, Gimli saw that there were more bones, more filth, that he had scarcely had time to glimpse when he first was down here, fragments scattered in corners and down the empty passages. There were more matted patches of sticks and reeds among the bones and rags, resembling the nest in the shaft which had broken Gimli’s fall.

Gimli thought grimly about what these clues suggested, and about the floor that seemed solid in the hut above, the first time they entered. Set to hide the mouth of the pit and break apart under the feet of the unwary. Something must go up there and reset the trap, once it had been sprung. How many times? How old was this lair?

Still they heard no sound but their own steps and the crackling of their own lights. Maybe the nameless trap-setter had died or left? That would be too lucky.

They cleared the passages one by one. The plan was for Legolas and half the archers to search each passage, while in the central chamber, the others kept watch with bow drawn on the remaining corridors; there might be connecting hallways that they could not see, letting an unseen enemy circle around them.

Gimli’s range iwas hobbled by his injured leg, so he was to stand behind them in the center. If they ran into something that couldn't be killed by arrows and it got through the elves, he’d hit it with his axe. _Not a particularly elegant plan,_ he thought to himself. _But gravel must do, when you have no stone._

They found the foe in the third corridor.

It came on them suddenly, a vast, grotesque mess of shrieking heads that twisted and screamed at them, spiralling out of a bloated body that dragged itself forward along the ground with a terrible squelching.

The elven archers fell back slowly, filling it with arrows. Legolas landed shot after shot directly into the things that looked like heads, yet it still struck at them. Some ichor that leaked from the fell creature was running across the floor. It became difficult for them to stay afoot. Suddenly one of the patrol was down, and one of the mouths swooped to tear at him while the others struggled to drag him back. There was no room for those behind them to shoot.

So Gimli dodged forward and struck at its lower parts with his axe. Once, with a sickening whump of metal hitting flesh, and again. It still came on. He cursed and put every inch of his remaining strength into his best backswing and his blade sunk deep into the bloated sack of its body. Something seemed to burst. There was a hideous stench and the thing gave a long, bubbling moan and retreated. His axe was pulled from his hands, still embedded in the fleeing creature.

Everyone in the party gathered together and stood their ground, breathing heavily, covered in sweat. The nameless monster had dragged itself just out of range, but lay still within sight, howling in an unbearable, piercing whine. They had no way to tell if it was mortally injured or no.

Gimli nudged his comrade. “Ah, will you look at that. Friend Legolas, would you mind just skipping down there and retrieving my weapon?”

“Certainly, right after you go fetch me back my arrows.” 

Gimli shrugged and pulled his other axe from its place on his back.

Legolas rolled his eyes and said to his kinsmen, _Gonnhorrim, ui enta hathol._ “With dwarves, there’s always another axe.” 

Oroben at last suggested fire itself should be tried as a weapon. From a safe distance they set balls of rags on fire and lobbed them, and Mahal have mercy, this actually appeared to work. The creature raged and burnt and burnt some more, until it was nothing but a crumbled mass of blackened flesh. For good measure Gimli quickly hacked at the ceiling of the passage until he brought it crashing down behind them.

They were ready to ascend.

Gently, the elves raised the body of the mutilated stranger to the surface. It seemed to take a terribly long time. They used ropes and their arms and the hand-holds Gimli cut on his first trip upward. It felt as if he had carved them a century ago and not mere hours.

At last they reach the top again. By now, the woods were lit by early dawn. They carried the lost one out of the cursed walls of the hut and laid him on the forest floor. His hair was matted with filth, his face so wasted as to look more a skull, and his body was much broken by the initial fall. His eyes had been taken from him, and his hands and feet and more.

 _How long can an elf live without food or water? How long survive terrible hurt, untended?_ Gimli thought. _A Man would perish in a day, a dwarf might last weeks, but one of these?_ He tasted sickness in his mouth.

The small company was kneeling around the stranger. They touched his brow, his body; poured water in their hands and tried a little to wipe away the mire. Lamben brought water to the victim’s lips and at last he seemed to rouse enough to know their touch, perhaps their voices. He stirred.

Suddenly, soundlessly, the elves rose and stood about him in a circle. His sightless face seemed to stare towards the forest and sky above their heads. His mouth moved without voice. Each of the patrol looked into each other’s eyes, and Gimli thought he saw not only pity and anger and sorrow, but almost despair. It seemed to him that they were debating without spoken word.

Suddenly, it seemed a decision had been made. Gentle Lamben began a song, high and uncanny, such as Gimli remembered their cousins singing in the southern forests after the terrible news from Khazad-Dum. He could seldom follow the words of Elvish songs, but he thought, _This is the sound they make when a loss is unfixable, and there is no comfort found. Alas for us all that it should be familiar to even my ear._ Legolas nodded to the others. The company of Woodland Elves stepped back. And Legolas took the bow of Galadriel and put an arrow in the throat of the stranger, saying, “I send you across the endless sea, where you shall be whole and free of this imprisonment.”

### Chapter 5: Ascending

Gimli wrung the dripping water out of his long hair and spread it over his shoulders to dry. A good fire warmed the guest room. Thranduil’s halls lay mostly below ground level, built for refuge in a darkening age; but they were both graceful and comfortable. All the walls and ceilings of the chamber were paneled in wood and carved with elaborate work of running deer amid a forest. Coverings of deerskin and fur were heaped on the bedding and chairs.

A healer had seen to his leg and a good wash has soothed his aches, though he was still bruised from their ill-fated expedition. Even a flagon of good red wine has been provided. He thought about asking for ale in its place, but instead merely thanked the elf who brought it, venturing a word in badly-accented Sindarin to the steward's evident amusement.

 _How monstrous courteous I am growing,_ he thought. _How Aragorn would open his eyes, were he here._ He would have to remember to tell his own father Gloin that the High King of Men and the Free Peoples knew some of the ugliest curses ever to rip from a dwarrow tongue; it would tickle him greatly.

But that line of thought made him think of his friends and the Fellowship, of Moria and of Lothlorien. He tried to put those memories away, as one would fold up a fragile treasure that brings too much sadness to handle.

Now would sleep have been most reasonable and welcome; therefore, it relentlessly stayed away. Perhaps it was just as well, since he had no taste for the images that might come after his closed his eyes. Those could not be as easily washed away as the muck from the pit.

So he gave his hands something to do. He had some leather laces in his pack, and he began to braid a new thong for his axe handle. He would have to see about crafting or trading for another weapon to replace the one he’d lost in this fight. After the monster was burnt, he hadn’t cared to handle the axe head left among the black, ruined flesh. There it would lie in the sealed-off pit for all time.

Agh. This was not helping. He unwound the leather strings and began again. This time, to strengthen his heart, he started a song; an old one in his people’s secret tongue. Men might have called it a chant, for it was deep and repetitive and rhythmic, something for working and not prettiness.

There was a quiet sound. Gimli looked up and found that Legolas had come into the room. He closed the door behind him and leaned against it. He shut his eyes, then opened them and stared at his friend. But he spoke no word. The torchlight glinted in his hair, which was all loose about his shoulders, and he wore nothing but plain linens, such as Gimli had seen the folk here put on to go about some common work. What task it might be that Legolas had in hand, his friend could not imagine. Elves do not sleep in the same fashion as mortals, but they take rest all the same. After their unhappy adventure, why was his friend not finding for himself some hours of peace?

Gimli waited. Silence seemed to pool between them, and yet he thought it seemed underlaid with a ringing, just beyond the edge of hearing. Whatever mood this was, he could not name it. It was Legolas who broke the stillness, crossing the space between them, and coming to sit by Gimli’s side on the bed. “Could you . . .” Legolas paused and then said, as if changing his mind about some unspoken request, “Could you go on? With what you are making, and your song?”

So Gimli did, bending his head over his hand, but all aware in every nerve of that body stretched out next to him. After a while he finished and turned on his side, towards the Elf. “Twas a foul day. I hoped we were shed of such sights, in this new age.”

“That is not the way of this world,” said Legolas sadly, “Our victories are brief.”

They were still again for a moment and then Legolas said, “I missed you.”

Gimli said, “When was this? Have I not dogged your steps from one end of this Middle-earth to the other? I see how it is, you cannot do without the mightiness of the Dwarves for a wee hour, now that you have learnt its worth.”

He was striving valiantly for the laughing tone that was the way of things between them, but yet he felt wrong-footed. There ought by rights to have been a slap at the culture and manners of Legolas’ people in there, but he could do not do it for the life of him. All the tragedy of the ages he had heard in the words a _cross the sea_ this day, and how he was to bear it he did not know.

Legolas said simply, “You fell.”

And Gimli grasped him roughly and brought him near, saying, “Nay, but I climbed back up to you!”

“You fell, and I saw in my heart all the empty years after your death.” Legolas face remained peaceful all this while, but there was in it at once beauty, bewilderment and something like defeat: as in a picture Gimli once had seen in an ancient book, of a long-ago hero slain upon a futile quest.

“Which by Mahal’s will may be many years hence,” he all but roared, and in confusion he realized he was shaking Legolas by the shoulders. He was shocked to find that he was beginning to weep, though his friend’s eyes were dry.

Suddenly, Legolas put his hand to Gimli’s hair and stroked it. And then he ran his fingers down the side of Gimli’s face, smiling a little when he came to the beard, and then he kissed him on the mouth.

Gimli drew back astonished. And then he realized that he was likewise _not_ surprised, but relieved, and he pulled Legolas still closer to him and returned the kiss, breaking it only to fiercely kiss his brow also and then his neck, which drew a cry so exquisite that he changed the kiss to a bite.

At that, Legolas pulled himself from Gimli’s arms and hurled himself off the bed and for a bad moment he thought, _Too far?_ But then Legolas was ripping his tunic off straight over his head, and springing back to him and he had just time to think:  _Apparently just far enough._

### Epilogue

Your Majesty, King Elessar:

Our visit to the Woodland Realm draws to a close. Legolas has raised the issue of the embassy to restore the land of Ithilien. I will leave him to write of his father the King’s reflections on the matter.

We met with a strange adventure in the southern forest of which I would send you news, so that Steward Faramir can put it into the annals of Gondor, and so I will also do for my people and Legolas for his, for there were mysteries about it that we never solved. Perhaps someone will read of this and answer our questions, or take warning, if the like is discovered again.

Though Sauron is gone and Saruman is gone, their marks are not. Many strange dangers and the traces of sad crimes are still being uncovered. The work of making these woods safe again will take the labor of many years, and the elves are fewer than they were. Thranduil sends out patrols to explore the distant groves that were long in darkness. But the forest is vast and the work arduous and hard on the heart, as well you would ween.

After we had visited some weeks at the Elf King’s court, we found his noted courtesy and good humour, of which you have such experience, like to exhaust us. Therefore, when Legolas and I were invited to join one of the patrols that was going far afield, we accepted readily.

Deep in the forest we come across a strange thing, a crude lodge or hut, that seemed too ancient to be the work of the local Mankind such as the Beornings or Woodsmen, yet too rough and badly-made to be the work of Elves.

When we ventured inside, what looked to be a solid floor gave way suddenly, for there was a concealed snare underneath. We found within this deep pit a terrible monster, unknown to the lore of either of our people. We slew it.

We destroyed all, but on the back of this I have drawn the structure of the place, both on the surface and underneath, and also this unnamed Foe, so that they may be recognized if seen again.

There was an elf alive in the trap, sore wounded. We bore him out, but he died, and we found no token to tell us who he was, and he was not one of Thranduil’s. If any have word who this might have been, it would be a good thought to send word to this realm, for it saddened them much.

Legolas and I go next to the Lonely Mountain, where I will fetch you some crafty Dwarves who can properly fix that city of yours.

Respectfully,

G

\--- The End---

**Author's Note:**

> Author’s Notes
> 
>   * This story is generally compatible with either LOTR Movieverse or Bookverse 
>   * Except that in my head, all music is very much from the immortal film score of Howard Shore, and there is an in-universe reference to haunting theme, [The Bridge at Khazad Dum](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-enArWoy9Gs&list=LL3lR3WpROXE2OLi6WbS3tJg&index=1)
>   * Some nightmare fuel, but then again: Tolkien. 
>   * I love looking at word lists for the Middle Earth languages but have no real knowledge, especially of the grammar. Feel free to send word if there’s something to fix. 
> 

> 
> Word Lists
> 
>  _Oyta_ : Oi! Hey! Khuzdul  
>  _Tada gulud_ : You’re right! Khuzdul.  
>  _Ekun derazi_ : This fellow’s been gnawed on, or bitten. Ekun (person); Deraz (eat). Khuzdul.  
>  _Mata_ : Devoured, eaten. Sindarin.  
>  _Naugrim, ui enta hathol_ : With dwarves, there’s always another axe. Sindarin.
> 
>  
> 
> #  
> If you kudo, thank you and bless you. Comments are the soul food of this writer nom nom, so if you feel all inclined, it will make me happy!
> 
> On tumblr at [www.tumblr.com/blog/lordnelson100](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/lordnelson100%20) and if you super liked something and want to tell folks, well, thus are the seeds of fic scattered through the land!


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